Red cell membrane and malaria

Malaria is the most serious and widespread parasitic disease of humans, with up to 500 million people being infected each year with malaria parasites and a million individuals, predominantly infants and young children, dying as a consequence of the infection. During intra-erythrocytic life cycle of 48h, over 400 proteins produced by parasites are exported into the red cell cytoplasm and a number of these proteins interact with membrane skeleton. Significant progress is being made in identifying the binding domains in both parasite proteins and red cell proteins that mediate protein-protein interactions. These various parasite-red cell protein interactions are responsible for striking structural and morphological changes in the infected red cell including loss of normal discoid shape, perturbations in the rheological and adhesive properties of the cell that are responsible for the clinical manifestation of malaria infection, malarial anemia and cerebral malaria. It is anticipated these ongoing advances will offer opportunities for the discovery of new and urgently needed therapeutic targets for the treatment of malaria.